Welcome to our regular round up of the month in mobile marketing, and no review of the last few weeks could start anywhere other than with Antennagate and the reception problems afflicting Apple’s iPhone 4 handset.

At the start of the month, Apple revealed that it had got to the bottom of the problem. The issue, it said, was not that the phone loses signal when held in a certain way; rather, it was not displaying the signal strength correctly in the first place.

As the pressure built over the next couple of weeks, including a class action lawsuit filed against Apple and US network AT&T by a group of iPhone 4 users, Apple changed tack, admitting there was a problem, and offering a free bumper case to iPhone 4 owners, in addition to the previously-announced software update to fix the signal strength display issue. Even then, however, Apple was in combative mood, as CEO Steve Jobs used the press conference called to announce the fix to claim that Antennagate was not unique to the iPhone. Jobs showed videos of the BlackBerry Bold 9700 and HTC Droid apparently experiencing a similar problem, prompting the expected outraged response from Blackberry-maker RIM.

Then just a couple of days ago, just as the fuss seemed to be dying down, a new report from PA Consulting suggested that the ‘Death Grip’ problem was “unique to iPhone 4”. And of course, at the end of it all, Apple still emerged smelling of roses as it posted record third quarter revenues of $15.7bn (£10.26bn), and net quarterly profit of $3.25bn, compared to $9.73bn and $1.83bn respectively for Q3, 2009.

Elsewhere, there was hard evidence of the problems Nokia is facing as it released its second quarter results, which revealed a 40 per cent slump in profits to €227m (£192m), compared to €380m a year ago. In a separate move, Nokia’s head of mobile solutions, Anssi Vanjoki, denied rumours that Nokia was planning to launch Android phones, reaffirming the company’s commitment to Symbian and MeeGo.

While some in the mobile business are feeling the strain, however, there was plenty of good news too. Amazon revealed that its customers had ordered more than $1bn worth of goods from Amazon using a mobile device in the past 12 months, while a survey from mobile marketing firm Sponge found that retailers are seeing increased sales, higher customer engagement and reduced service costs from the mobile internet.

Sponge surveyed 136 retailers in June and July. Of those that had dedicated mobile sites, 39 per cent of retailers cited the key benefit as ‘”sales from a new channel”, while two thirds said their mobile sites enabled them to receive positive feedback from customers able to interact with their brand wherever they were. Despite this, however, the survey also revealed that two thirds of retailers have not yet optimised their sites for mobile.

Several companies were in the money, having secured funds to expand their mobile offerings. Online and mobile dating service Flirtomatic raised $9m in Series C funding from Nauta Capital and existing investors Doughty Hanson, Seraphim Capital and Chairman Avi Azulai. Mobile ad network InMobi secured
$8m in its Series B round from existing investors Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sherpalo Ventures. Some of the funds will be used to double the firm’s engineering staff to further enhance its mobile advertising technology platform. And CloudMade raised $12.3m in a Series B investment round led by new investor Greylock Partners. The company will use the funds to further accelerate its work to build the world’s most comprehensive map and geo database, and serve this data to developers, device manufacturers and mobile operators through its mapping platform.

The BBC was in celebratory mood too, as it was given the go-ahead by the BBC Trust to proceed with the launch of three smartphone apps announced earlier this year. The move followed an investigation by the Trust, prompted by complaints from rivals, that concluded that a Public Value Test (PVT) was not required. The first app, available now, is a BBC News app for the iPhone.

Finally, on the network front, Vodafone launched its Vodafone Mobile Clicks 2010 competition to identify and develop the best, most innovative mobile internet start-ups. And 3 UK became the latest operator to call time on unlimited data plans, with the launch of The One Plan. While data usage is capped at 1GB per month, the plan does also offer a monthly allowance of 2,000 any-network minutes, 5,000 3-to-3 minutes and 5,000 texts from £25 a month. That’s a pretty competitive offering in anyone’s book; a sign, perhaps, that there is more to mobile life than flat-rate data.

We’re smack bang in the middle of the holiday season now of course, so we appreciate that things may be a little quiet, but we will be with you throughout August with all the mobile marketing news that’s fit to print. So stay tuned, and have a great summer.

David Murphy
Editor